Model comparison
Granite 4.2 3b vs Qwen3.6 Plus
Qwen3.6 Plus is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.5 to 39.4 on the Noometry Index.
Last verified . 11 shared benchmarks.
Alibaba (Qwen)Summary
- They share 11 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 4.2 3b scores higher in 0 categories and Qwen3.6 Plus in 7 categories; 6 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Qwen3.6 Plus leads 56.1 to 36.3.
- Granite 4.2 3b has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Granite 4.2 3b | Qwen3.6 Plus | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | IBM | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 39.4 | 47.5 |
| Released | — | 2026-03-31 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |
| Context window | — | 1M |
| Max output | — | 66K |
| Input $ / M tokens | — | $0.50 |
| Output $ / M tokens | — | $3 |
| Results tracked | 11 | 37 |
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Category by category
Coding Too close to call
Granite 4.2 3b: 40.0 (#151), Qwen3.6 Plus: 40.8 (#130)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1361 | 1467 |
| SWE-bench Verified | — | 57.9% |
| LMArena WebDev | — | 1461 |
| SciCode | — | 40.7% |
| ALE-Bench | — | 670.15 |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Granite 4.2 3b: —, Qwen3.6 Plus: —
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| Vending-Bench 2 | — | 5,115 |
Reasoning Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 26.0 (#138), Qwen3.6 Plus: 29.3 (#93)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1306 | 1449 |
| NYT Connections (extended) | — | 60.3% |
| CritPt | — | 2.9% |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 17% |
| Thematic Generalization | — | 59.5% |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | — | 12% |
| DTBench | — | 81.9% |
| LMCA | — | 33.1% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 147.65 |
Math Not comparable
Granite 4.2 3b: —, Qwen3.6 Plus: 51.8 (#54)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | — | 38.2% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 93.3% |
| LMArena Math | — | 1450 |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | — | 26.2% |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1) | — | 8.3% |
Knowledge Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 36.3 (#171), Qwen3.6 Plus: 56.1 (#45)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1315 | 1454 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 88.4% |
| SimpleQA Verified | — | 44.1% |
Multilingual Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 42.1 (#198), Qwen3.6 Plus: 53.3 (#70)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1268 | 1424 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1269 | 1477 |
| LMArena Russian | 1249 | 1434 |
| LMArena French | — | 1455 |
| LMArena German | — | 1452 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1389 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1379 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1432 |
Instruction Following Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 67.1 (#200), Qwen3.6 Plus: 75.0 (#74)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1273 | 1425 |
Long Context Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 39.2 (#185), Qwen3.6 Plus: 45.2 (#49)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1291 | 1439 |
| CL-bench | — | 20.3% |
Writing & Preference Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 47.2 (#212), Qwen3.6 Plus: 62.2 (#82)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1293 | 1437 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1205 | 1404 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1290 | 1438 |
Frequently asked questions
Is Granite 4.2 3b better than Qwen3.6 Plus?
Qwen3.6 Plus is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.5 to 39.4 on the Noometry Index.
Is Granite 4.2 3b or Qwen3.6 Plus better for coding?
They score almost the same on coding (40.0 vs 40.8); test both on your own repository before choosing.
How many benchmarks do Granite 4.2 3b and Qwen3.6 Plus share?
11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 4.2 3b has 11 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.6 Plus has 37.